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Sunday, July 8, 2012

On creative process- one of my favorite stories.....Joseph Campbell had a story that he would share about a calligrapher that was commissioned to do a painting of a cat......
Every month, the client would go to the artist's studio and ask if the piece was ready and the artist would say no. finally, after many many months the client went to the artist studio and demanded that the painting be produced for him or he would arrest the artist. The artist then calmly took out paper brush and ink and in one fluid motion created a sublime painting of a cat. The Client, aghast at the beauty of the piece, turns to the artist and asks, "Why did you make me wait so long?" The artist then turns around and opens a cupboard, and thousands of drawings of cats come pouring out.
I relay this story to all of my students- it illustrates perfectly the hours of meditation trial and errors that every artist goes through when making their visions come to life.
I hope you are all having a great summer and are making lots of sketches for your cupboards :-)
ciao- Maureen
ps- if you aren't familiar with Joseph Campbell I strongly urge you to click on his name, which takes you to the Wikipedia article on him- he is one of my favorite mentors on living a creative and blissful life. <3